THE CAP FITS
THIS HORSE HAS EVERYTHING AND IS MY TIP ... OUTSIDE OF MY DAD’S ANY SECOND NOW RUBY WALSH
THE 2021 Randox Grand National meeting starts on Thursday, exactly 21 years after Ruby Walsh rode Papillon to victory in the great race – at his very first attempt.
Walsh, then a month short of his 21st birthday, went on to become one of the greats of the National Hunt weighing rooms.
But for all the riches that flowed over the next two decades – another National, aboard Hedgehunter in 2005, and the two Cheltenham Gold Cups among a record 59 Festival wins – nothing beat the Aintree triumph for his father, Ted.
“I still think the greatest day I had in racing was winning the Grand National for my dad,” says Walsh, who brings the effortless gift manifest in his riding days to the ITV studio this week.
Walsh, who retired from the saddle at the 2019 Punchestown Festival, admits loyalty would steer him towards Any Second Now, trained by his father and sister Katie, if he could pick a mount next Saturday.
“Is he the most likely winner? I couldn’t tell you, but if you’re asking me which one I’d like to be on, I wouldn’t mind another feeling like that again.”
Pressed to choose without sentiment,
Walsh sides with the betting market and Cloth Cap – expected to face the starting tapes as the shortest favourite since Red Rum, winner of the previous two Nationals, went off at 7-2 in 1975.
“If you’re asking me which one I would ride because I think it’ll win, I’d be looking at Cloth Cap,” adds Walsh.
“He’s done nothing wrong and, in theory, he’s so far ahead of the handicapper. He jumps, travels, has pace and stays. He’s probably going to be hard to beat.”
Irish runners were
dominant at Cheltenham last month, capturing 23 of the Festival’s 28 races, and are once again poised to profit if Cloth Cap doesn’t live up to market expectations.
Burrows Saint, Walsh’s winning ride for ally Willie Mullins in the Irish Grand National two years ago, and Minella Times, seeking to give Rachael Blackmore a place in history as the first woman jockey to triumph, stalk Cloth Cap in the betting.
Walsh still talks with the wide-eyed wonder millions of us will share leading up to 5.15pm next
Saturday. “It’s not the kind of race you can think, ‘If I could get on the best horse, I could win,’” he says.
“You can dream about a Champion Hurdle or a Gold Cup because, in theory, if you go to the start on the best horse – unless you make a mistake – you’ll win.
“But the Grand National is a lottery.
“And every way you dress it up, it’s the race everybody wants to win.”